One of Key and Peele’s most viral bits is their rapid-fire college-football-player introductions, originally inspired by New York Jets offensive lineman D’Brickashaw Ferguson. “D’Brickashaw Ferguson! What? That was it for us,” Keegan Michael Key tells us. Their first sketch, with such players as Hingle McKringleberry and Donkey Teeth, aired last season and has since gathered more than 17 million views on YouTube. Last week, they released a follow-up, and it already has 5.5 million views. The names are so perfectly crafted for maximum hilarity, but how do they come up with them? Turns out there is a crucial third collaborator on these bits, without whom they could never be written: “I enjoy writing these names with a little help from Mr. Weed,” Jordan Peele tells us. “He’s an amazing writer.”
Key: We’ve had him on our staff for years. He’s worked with Jordan for, like, fourteen years.
Peele: It’s just, like, my favorite hobby now, thinking of these names. At this point, it’s the most fun part of the writing process. There’s not too many that don’t make the cut. We use the whole buffalo. The whole buffalo. You just reach a point where you just know when you got one. As the saying goes, “When you’ve got Eqqsquizitine Buble-Schwinslow … ” Yeah, there’s not really a process.
Key: People be loving some D’Pez Poopsie.
Peele: That was the first one I came up with for this new season. It was the one that made me realize, “Oh, it is possible to continue this without it getting boring.” It cracked me up.
Key: The first time we ever did it, I couldn’t believe it. I came to work, and Jordan just hands me this script. Within 30 seconds, I couldn’t breathe.
Peele: Hardest I’ve ever seen him laugh.
Key: It just gets me. “L’Carpetron Dookmarriot.” I’ll just never get over that ever in my life.
Peele: I’m surprised we’re not getting as much feedback on Equine Ducklings. Horselike baby ducks, I mean …
